Customer Reviews

Beechers, Stowes, and Yankee Strangers: The Transformation of Florida (Florida History and Culture)

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Florida history remains a bit of a wilderness so any book looking at the past of the Sunshine State should be a valuable contribution but this book fails to offer much of anything. The Fosters look at a number of Northeners who moved to Florida during and after the Civil War and how they attempted to transform the culture of Florida. The subjects include Harriet Beecher Stowe and her brother as well as Harrison Reed and his wife Chloe. The Fosters offer little on Stowe that can not be found in a number of other works, including Joan Hedrick's Pulitzer prize winning biography. Their take on the Reeds seems a bit off. While they are solid on Chloe, an idealistic school teacher who came down South during the war to teach freed slaves at Amelia Island and North Carolina, they misread Harrison Reed. Reed was no idealist to say the least nor did he share his wife's commitments to helping the freedmen. While a freesoiler before the war, Reed was a political opponent of the abolitionists and their champions at the national level (namely Salmon P. Chase who had a grudge with Reed when Reed worked for Chase's Treasury Department). Reed was a supporter of President Andrew Johnson, no friend to the freedman to be sure. It's a not uncommon phenomenon in American politics; centrist politician and liberal wife (think FDR and Clinton for example). Reed simply was not the saint the Fosters portray him as. For a much better and accurate portrait of the Reeds, take a look at Richard Current's "Those Terrible Carpetbaggers" (and yes the name is ironic).

The Fosters misreading of Reed is indicative of a larger problem. For a work of Florida history, this book seems firmly ungrounded in Florida's past. While 19th century Florida again remains a bit of a historic frontier, the Fosters seem to think that there was nothing in Florida before Reconstruction. Furthermore, they seem to think that the transformation of Florida started with the travel literature and high culture that the Stowe circle created. This is not acceptable. While the Fosters may not wish to open their eyes to it, there was one man who transformed Florida and he did it with iron and cash as opposed to books and newspapers. Henry Flager, for better or for worse, with his hotels and railways did much more to transform Florida than the Stowes and Reeds ever did. It may be easier on the soul to think that noble writers like Mrs. Stowe did much more to change Florida than a ruthless womanizer like Flager but it simply is not true.

The Fosters seem content to think that Florida was transformed by a number of noble do gooders from up North. Those that take the past seriously should ignore their siren song and confront the past in its reality, now matter how harsh it is. This book, while readable, has little grounding in history and the basic primary and secondary sources. Needless to say this pleasant whitewashing of the past should be ignored.